Have you ever read a book,
So sad it made you cry?
Have you ever read a book,
So much that you felt high?
Have you ever read a book,
So real you felt in sync?
Have you ever read a book,
So sensual you turned pink?

Have you ever watched a movie,
So dynamic you wish you could fly?
Have you ever watched a movie,
So convincing you'd comply?
Have you ever watched a movie,
So awesome you couldn't blink?
Have you ever watched a movie,
So perplexing it made you think?

Have you ever imagined these stories,
And really wished them to be true?
Have you ever sat and realized,
That these stories helped shape you?

the average human
describes their heartbeat
as a thud-thud or a few
rough pats to the chest.

i fall asleep with my ear
pressed up against your
chest. all i can hear is the
echo of a captain yelling,
"let me sink...let me sink..."
i ask you how you would
describe your heartbeat,
you point to the ship
in the bottle mounted on
your father's bookshelf
& faintly say
"the glass bottle keeps the
ship from sinking, completely
blocking out the captain's wish
to learn how to breathe
underwater because air just
isn't doing its job with keeping
him alive."

your break up letter to me
went a little something like;

"you were built in the fire,
stop acting like you burn in it.
you were never made to be fragile,
you were never made to be my glass."

my plead for you to stay
went a little something like;

(20) Missed Calls

your final goodbye
went a little something like;

a thud thud to the pavement.

& my final goodbye was
cracking open a bottle on your
headstone & standing in the sea
with the water rising up to
my knees, with a small ship in
the palm of my hand, a dunk
underneath the tide & a faint
whisper, *"breathe."

he’s telling me about the girl at school
he can’t get out of his head,
and how he feels like
it’s always this chain of
"i don’t want all these people that want me,"
(i winced)
“and the one person i want doesn’t want me
in the same way.”
(i inhaled sharply)

i told him he’s overthinking it,
and when he asked, “how do you not?”
(i forgot to breathe)

my eyes got watery, but i blinked quickly
before they could settle
(i exhaled)

and replied,
“i'll let you know.”

dream, tired
wake up, tired
get up, tired
get going, tired
hi, tired
bye, tired
leave, tired
come, tired
sleep, tired
dream, tired
exhausted, tired
echo

drowning in my own sorrows,
tender heart shattering at memories.
skin breaking open,
because isn't that what he wanted?
tear drenched face,
no hope for tomorrow.
I'm doing this for him,
he told me to do this.
he told me to end myself.
I'm following my orders.
because it's a sin
to
disrespect
your father.

Don't savor the pain yet reject the hand that tries to help you though I cannot possibly understand what you have been through.  But I see you, I see your pain.  I may not have lived your past but it didn't last and yet we can if you do not push me away so fast.  I just want to listen when you want to talk, hold you when you can't and tell you how the stars got their names.